Letter: ED change due

With the change in leadership of the Chamber of Commerce, Lawrence has an opportunity to rethink how it handles economic development.

Now the city and county taxpayers give over $450,000 per year to the chamber for economic development purposes, not including the incubators or the Bioscience Authority.

The record of the chamber is a history of failures.

The chamber led the city into many tax abatements that failed to generate the promised jobs, wages and investments. The chamber repeatedly supported the overbuilding of retail space, hurting the downtown and other existing retail centers, and it even supported tax breaks for retail space, the antithesis of economic development. The chamber initiated meetings with the City Commission that later were found to be in violation of the Kansas Open Meetings Act, causing our city commissioners to be censured by the attorney general. The chamber has been caught making false statements and misrepresentations before the Public Incentives Review Committee. The chamber has never been transparent about its use of the taxpayer funds.

Smart cities across the nation have brought economic development planning inside city hall through the hiring of skilled professionals educated in economic development. Staff members at the chamber are not educated in economic development and are not accountable to the City Commission. Rather, they are advocates for business interests at the taxpayers’ expense.

The city of Lawrence should use the change in leadership of the chamber to put economic development into the hands of professionals who are accountable to the public.

Non-chamber candidates would likely would be the low spenders which would indicate that's who voters should put in office. Local business people as commissioners has proved to be a disaster regarding tax dollar management and reckless spending.

"Rather, they are advocates for business interests at the taxpayers’ expense." The understatement. Can we say home to the Free Lunch aka local corporate welfare that never pays back.

There are a variety of ways local government increases taxes and/or fees without saying. Such as issuing bonds of sorts....

Definition of 'General Obligation Bond - GO' A municipal bond backed by the credit and "taxing power" of the issuing jurisdiction rather than the revenue from a given project.

Investopedia explains 'General Obligation Bond - GO'

General obligation bonds are issued with the belief that a municipality will be able to repay its debt obligation through taxation or revenue from projects. No assets are used as collateral.
http://bonds.about.com/od/munibonds/a/

--- direct pay-outs to developers --- For example in Lawrence downtown two more 9th and New Hampshire structures looking at more and quite healthy multi-million tax $$$$ “donations if you will” aka Free Lunch